The evolution of port-city relations in the era of technological development: case study of Bandar-Abbas County, Iran

The port-city interface, as a spatial-functional concept, and its relations have been reproduced many times in developed and developing countries. However, there are few studies on such relations in West Asia while urbanization and shipping in this region are considered ancient concepts. The present study investigates the port-city relations in Bandar-Abbas County after the establishment and exploitation of Shahid Rajaee container port to bridge the gap in the study of port-city relations in West Asia, with distinct national–international political contexts. Also, it aims to methodologically analyze the interface as a multi-layered space where the city and the port geographically meet, and different urban, port, and related industrial uses cooperate, conflict, and give character to the port-city. In other words, the present study seeks to understand how the development of containerization of the port and the subsequent required spatial changes in recent decades have influenced the formation of port-city relations in Bandar-Abbas County. To this end, the social, spatial-functional, economic, and governance components are investigated and analyzed, using the qualitative approach of constructivist grounded theory. The extracted category clusters indicate that the city and the port have experienced four temporal-spatial stages in their relations during this period. Although in Bandar-Abbas County, no large-scale displacement of uses is observed, introducing new port and industrial uses to the outskirts of the city under factors such as macro-policies and the economy, has created a lot of competition, in addition to increasing spatial-functional conflict in the port-city interface. In general, despite a great social cohesion in port-city relations, these relations have developed separately in spatial, functional, economic, and governance areas.